Environmental groups blast Northern Pass utility project

Several environmental groups are challenging statements made by Northeast Utilities' Chief Executive Officer Tom May about the $1.1 billion Northern Pass transmission project, which is intended to bring Canadian hydropower produced by Hydro-Quebec into New England.

During a Nov. 13 Edison Electric Institute financial conference in Arizona, May's remarks included comments about the Northern Pass project. The project designed to bring 1,200 megawatts of electricity generated in Canada into New Hampshire, where much of the power would then be sent to southern New England, which consumes much of the region's power.

During nearly 34 minutes of recorded comments by May that are available online, NU's top executive said the value of the Northern Pass project to the region is huge.

"There is no project that has anywhere near this impact," May told conference attendees. "Many of you have heard about the Cape Wind Project; this (Northern Pass) has six to seven times the environmental value. It's a pretty big environmental impact and this has the support of every environmental group in New England, basically."

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Several environmental groups fighting Northern Pass have seized on May's statement, saying that he has misrepresented their positions.

"He was either irresponsibly misinformed or following a pattern of wishful thinking that has become all too prevalent for Northeast Utilities," said Jack Savage, a spokesman for the Society for the Protection of New Hampshire Forests, which is in the midst of a $2.5 million fund rasing campaign to acquire four large tracts in northern New Hampshire that would block the Northern Pass project.

"In fact, CLF is not aware of a single New England environmental group that supports the Northern Pass project as proposed," Courchesne wrote in a Nov. 15 blog post on the group's website. "May's statement is all the more puzzling given the energy that NU has devoted to attacking the efforts of groups like CLF, the Appalachian Mountain Club and the Society for the Protection of New Hampshire Forests.

Mike Skelton, an NU spokesman, said Friday that company officials "are well aware that SPNHF and CLF are opposed to Northern Pass and have several times pointed examples of how these groups prefer to distort the truth as part of their campaign against the project."

"This recent parsing of the support of environmental groups comment is more of the same," Skelton said. "SPNHF and CLF have thrown this quote around without the full context. To be clear, Mr. May was pointing out that the Cape Wind project is widely supported by New England's environmental groups and we hope the Northern Pass Project earns similar support, because it is an even better project from an environmental perspective."

Skeleton said NU this week alone has secured access to more than 20 miles of northern New Hampshire land that it needs to run the overhead transmission lines.

The battle between environmental groups and the company is over the northernmost 40 miles of the project; the remaining 140 miles of the project would be done on existing rights of way maintained by NU's Public Service Co. of New Hampshire subsidiary.

Savage said his group already has raised $1 million toward its goal of blocking the current route of Northern Pass, and will close on two of the four property conservation easements it needs within several weeks.

"A number of potential donors have suggested that it would be beneficial to them if we could push their gifts into 2013 and so we are doing that," he said, adding that SPNHF expects to reach the full $2.5 million it needs sometime during the first three months of 2013.